4. NVIDIA Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA)
Number of Hedge Fund Investors: 186
Earlier this month, while highlighting the Big 10 AI stocks and their contribution to the overall market returns, BofA’s Michael Hartnett said that if we exclude NVIDIA Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA), the S&P 500’s YTD gains narrow to just 7.9%. Nvidia is indeed one of the big ten, if not the biggest, AI stock right now. Oppenheimer recently increased its price target on NVIDIA Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA) to $150 from $110 after the stock’s 10-1 split.
Barclays Tom O’Malley recently gave bullish comments on the stock, with a $145 price target and an Overweight rating. The analyst pointed to a potential $25 billion opportunity from countries building up their AI capabilities. O’Malley expects NVIDIA Corp’s (NASDAQ:NVDA) earnings at $3.62 per share in fiscal 2026, while Wall Street analysts on average have a $3.55 per share estimate for NVIDIA Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA) earnings for 2026.
NVIDIA Corp’s (NASDAQ:NVDA) latest product announcements and its plans revealed at the Computex 2024 show that NVIDIA Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA) has much more in its arsenal to power its growth engine. Analysts like NVIDIA Corp’s (NASDAQ:NVDA) shift to new AI architecture known as Rubin (R100) and think its powerful H100 and Blackwell chips easily beat competitors.
NVIDIA Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA) will start shipping H200 in the second half of this year. At its GTC conference NVIDIA Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA) revealed three accelerators – B200, GB200 and GB200 NVL72. All of these products provide growth catalysts for NVIDIA Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA) shares and justify its P/E multiple of 71, given NVIDIA Corp’s (NASDAQ:NVDA) growth expectation of over 100% this year and 32% next year. Based on 2026 EPS estimate set by Wall Street, NVIDIA Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA) is trading at a forward P/E multiple of 35.74, which makes the stock’s valuation attractive given the growth catalysts it has.
RiverPark Large Growth Fund stated the following regarding NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) in its first quarter 2024 investor letter:
“NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA): NVDA shares were our top contributor in the quarter following blowout 4Q results and 1Q guidance driven by strong data center sales. The company reported quarterly revenue of $22.1 billion, up 265% year-over-year, and EPS in the quarter of $5.16, up 487% year-over-year and 12% ahead of expectations. Revenue guidance for 1Q of $24 billion was 8% above very high expectations. The artificial intelligence arms race kicked-off by ChatGPT and Alphabet’s Bard, among others, has generated tremendous demand for Nvidia’s next generation graphic processors.
NVDA is the leading designer of graphics processing units (GPU’s) required for powerful computer processing. Over the past 20 years, the company has evolved through innovation and adaptation from a predominantly gaming-focused chip vendor to one of the largest semiconductor/software vendors in the world. Over the past decade, the company has grown revenue at a compound annual rate of over 20% while expanding operating margins and, through its asset light business model, producing ever increasing amounts of free cash flow. Following recent results, Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA stated in the company’s press release, “a trillion dollars of installed global data center infrastructure will transition from general purpose to accelerated computing as companies race to apply generative AI into every product, service and business process.”
